What Bliss
by Little Obsessions
Summary: "Look at her: I would die for her, I would kill for her. Either way, what bliss." Of course he has killed for her...


**I don't have a beta in this fandom so, in spite of my attempts to self-edit until my eyes bleed, all mistakes are my own, unlike the Addams Family which does not belong to me.**

**Please enjoy, comments are life.**

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There is a puddle of blood, black-red, right in front of his brogues and it stops him in his tracks. It catches the moonlight like a captive, rippling it in its reflection, until it is distorted.

He should stop her, but then why would he want to?

She is magnificent like this, astride Baz's quivering thighs as his head lolls backwards against the high back of the chair, mouth agape.

Everything, he thinks, is justifiable when it comes to her. He had decided that the moment he laid eye on her.

Her thighs are as pale as the moonlight, and just as enchanting, and she has hitched her dress up and she is perched on her tiptoes as she leans forward and grips Baz's chin between her forefinger and thumb.

It feels a little intimate, if he's brutally honest, but that is what he gets for leaving her unattended.

The thought makes him smile.

He leans against the doorjamb, conscious of the fact that someone should probably serve as a barrier between the party raging inside and the rage blossoming out here.

And anyway, the voyeur in him is practically weeping with joy. He is reluctant to interrupt a creature at the height of her power in what is, arguably, her natural habitat.

She pinches Baz's chin between her pale fingers, and twist his head to the side as he emits a pitiful little groan, and – of all the things he thought he'd ever see, this didn't figure quite yet in his wild imaginings – she trails the razor-sharp red tip of her tongue up his cheek.

"You taste like fear," she murmurs, and Gomez is left breathless in the wake of her words. Then she shuffles back a little and the change of position means Gomez has an unimpeded view of his beloved cousin's hitherto pristine white shirt.

The knife lodged firmly in the spongy recess of his sternum is a blooming pool of black blood, giving him a comical cartoon appearance.

It looks fatal.

And for a moment, un-chivalrous as it may be, Gomez wonders if she is out of her depth. But his better sensibilities scold him and, as if she hears his silent treachery, she turns to him, still straddled across Baz's thighs as she twists her torso to look at him.

Her eyes are burning with hellfire, the kind he can taste as it sparks in the air. Her cheeks are almost flushed, and she glows with the kind of power he wishes he could devour. The power that draws him in, thrashes him, spits him out and compels him to come back for more, more, and more again for good measure.

She is as beautiful in this moment - pale, glittering, alive - as she is when she comes undone under him, his name a breathless prayer on her ruby lips.

He can't decide what version of her he is more in love with; though perhaps they are one and the same.

"Hello mon amour," she says softly, beckoning him with a gentle hand which is all the more enticing for the blood dripping down her fingers.

"We were supposed to dance," he says, without taking his eyes from the foamy trickle of blood sliding out of the side of Baz's mouth. Death is an attractive state, but he is not stupid enough to think the process is a pretty one. Then again, it is all the more beautiful for its ugliness.

"As enticing a sight as this is, would you care to explain?" He asks her calmly, knowing there has to be some dignified explanation for her straddling his cousin whom, it appears, she has fatally wounded.

He takes his handkerchief from his pocket and swipes the trail away from Baz's chin, and his cousin gives a grateful little gurgle. He nods, fold it up and puts it back.

"It is our engagement party after all," she says, cupping Baz's face with the very hand on which her engagement ring rests.

If Gomez was less of a man, the prickling jealousy he feels at his intended being so intimate with his cousin would irk him; but as it is, he tampers that jealousy down. He trusts her as he trusts that rain will fall and day will whisper into morning.

"Your cousin should have known to be far more respectful of your intended's boundaries, my love," she presses herself against Baz, and he lets out a groan Gomez knows well enough to recognise. "So I thought he might need a lesson in manners."

Gomez's fists pulse open and closed as he watches. He is starting to understand, and he wishes he could have remained ignorant.

"He made an assumption about my character," she strokes his cousin's quivering cheek, and one of Baz's tears run down the length of her pale finger. "Which was a dreadful miscalculation. You see, Baltazar, my commitment to your cousin runs deeper than even I can fathom."

Hot fury begins to build in Gomez, understanding now the fullness of his cousin's betrayal while paradoxically being astounded by the open intimacy of her words.

There is something deeply moving about it. The way in which she has given of her incredible self entirely.

"Did he -?"

She holds up her hand, "Shhh mon cher, do not vex yourself. I have him well in hand. Though for a fleeting moment, he thought quite the opposite."

She turns her attention to Balthazar, and her voice is soft and full and maternal, as if he is a child requiring close tutelage.

"Now Balthazar the knife is, I grant you, certainly intended to end your life. But timeous assistance from a doctor and some simple surgery would grant you the chance of living. If I leave you here, if I do _nothing_ but choose _not_ to seek help for you, you will die. Slowly."

Baz whines his terror.

At this she stands up slowly, excruciatingly, each part of her body a breath and gap away from Baz's terrified eyes as she does so. Then she bends at the middle and swipes her hands on Baz's trousers, leaving them stained scarlet but free from blood.

Her dress is immaculate, and having left her moment of ecstasy, her impeccable demeanour returns to its icy politeness.

She turns all of her attention, as well it should be, on Gomez now, and beckons him once more into her orbit.

He steps towards her as if pulled by a powerful magnet, like the tide pulled towards the shore.

"I will never betray you," she says softly, lacing her fingers within his trembling ones. "I love you, I want you, too much to ever betray you. Pity him for his ignorance. Now, mon cher, you choose…"

She leaves the challenge hanging in the air, and then she leans forward, and her kiss renders him powerless, reminds him that there is no such thing as a choice when it comes to her.

He consumes and is consumed simultaneously.

He will not ask her what Balthazar did; he does not need to know the details of the crime to trust that it merited the punishment. He just does.

And he knows that trust is the foundation of a healthy marriage.

She withdraws but pressed her mouth to his ear.

"When you've chosen, I will be waiting for you. A feast. You understand, non?"

He understands the promise, the everything that she is offering, even dressed in an elaborate metaphor.

He pictures her body, flushed with pleasure, soft with compliance, alive with the very essence of all her sins and all her desires, draped over his own.

He nods silently and pulls her towards him for one more kiss before she retreats. He watches her go, conscious too that Baz's eyes are on her.

He turns to his cousin, who's wheezing, belaboured breaths seem to fill the space.

The relief on Baz's face is palpable. They were born a month apart, and they shared the same ludicrous taste in cigars and – so it seems – women. They knew each other's worst and most absurd secrets. They roomed together at Yale and cheated the Bar exam together. Up until moments ago, they were thick as thieves.

Of course his relief is palpable.

Gomez reaches forward, and Baz manages a watery smile of gratefulness.

"Allez old man," Gomez says softly, and then he clutches the hilt and twists it deeper.

Turning, he hops over the swiftly growing pool of blood, cheered to hear the Blue Danube waltz as it carries on the breeze and smothers Baz's last breaths.


End file.
